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The Rational Response Squad is a group of atheist activists who impact society by changing the way we view god belief. This site is a haven for those who are pushing back against the norm, and a place for believers of gods to have their beliefs exposed as false should they want to try their hand at confronting us.

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In video games, most mythologies turn out to be at least partially true. I think Grandia 2 got it right, because they eventually learned that their "good" god has been dead for a long time, and then they killed the "evil" one.

"I've yet to witness circumstance successfully manipulated through the babbling of ritualistic nonsense to an imaginary deity." -- me (josh)

If god can do anything, can he make a hot dog so big even he can't eat all of it?

In video games, most mythologies turn out to be at least partially true. I think Grandia 2 got it right, because they eventually learned that their "good" god has been dead for a long time, and then they killed the "evil" one.

I've never played that. Is it good? I enjoyed the first one.

After eating an entire bull, a mountain lion felt so good he started roaring. He kept it up until a hunter came along and shot him.

How can you prove this, in a way all the other religions can not make the same claim?

How do you prove any worldview is the right one? How do you prove that liberalism is the right frame of mind to view the world than conservatism? How do you prove that humanism is the right worldview more so than Christianity?

I consider Christianity to be the "right one" because for me it paints the most accurate depiction of the human condition, as one of despair and hope, of love and depravity. And it stands as a worldview that murders every other sort of human illusion, in the tragedy at the heart of it, and yet picks itself out of the rubbles and envisions hope, and I find this to be empowering.

When i hear the privileged atheist mouth off about his worldview to me it ends up being a peddling of cotton candy fantasies, detached from the realities of life, it gives you Ted Turner, and life in Denmark to make sense of, Christianity gives us a murdered innocent, who for the sake of love died humiliatingly, a haunting image of man at it's bleakest, to make sense of, there's no cozy humanism here, just murdered illusions, and the last remnants of hope.

How can you prove this, in a way all the other religions can not make the same claim?

How do you prove that humanism is the right worldview more so than Christianity?

First we'd have to agree on what a "right worldview" would look like. Is it one that does not condone violence? One that insists upon freedom and equality?

To say that Christianity, as described in its doctrine, is a worldview that does not condone violence and that fosters freedom and equality would be difficult to defend. Even at a glance, the Christian text exposes itself as a barbaric and horrific philosophy dreamed up by people who thought the earth was flat.

Comparing that to Humanism, which has evolved into what is now a system of thought based on preserving humanity, progressing its understanding of its surroundings, and creating peace and equality for everyone, is a pretty tough sell. There are no passages in any humanist text (that I am aware of) that *ever* condone violence or oppression of *anyone* else. This is clearly not something we can say about the Christian texts.

First we'd have to agree on what a "right worldview" would look like. Is it one that does not condone violence? One that insists upon freedom and equality?

To say that Christianity, as described in its doctrine, is a worldview that does not condone violence and that fosters freedom and equality would be difficult to defend. Even at a glance, the Christian text exposes itself as a barbaric and horrific philosophy dreamed up by people who thought the earth was flat.

Comparing that to Humanism, which has evolved into what is now a system of thought based on preserving humanity, progressing its understanding of its surroundings, and creating peace and equality for everyone, is a pretty tough sell. There are no passages in any humanist text (that I am aware of) that *ever* condone violence or oppression of *anyone* else. This is clearly not something we can say about the Christian texts.

I'm sure Paris Hilton doesn't condone violence either. I might as well say those hippies, the children of the anthem "all we need is love", hold the "right worldview" a true and accurate worldview.

Humanism is a worldview that attempts to define itself like McCain did in the previous election, by diatribes of what their opponent (a religious worldview) is not, when it attempts to define itself it's plagued with meaninglessness, it becomes a term well off people use to label themselves as nice guys.

Humanism is a delusional worldview, in that it believes the case for being moral is won by rational arguments, that if we teach our children to "love our neighbors" as we do biology, or mathematics , they actually will love as such. Little do they know of our 9th grade class, called "conflict resolution" was plagued with physical altercations, that the teacher was incapable of educating us from preventing.

Little does the humanist know that moral acts are not committed out of rational arguments for doing so, but out of conviction, something that a rational argument doesn't produce. I can't say "love your neighbor" is a good view to hold, and will myself to hold it.

Humanist thought is like Ted Turner, who believes he's never robbed a man at gun point, because he's a humanist, and the project dwelling black man who robbed a person I knew the other day, did so because he wasn't one. If only he was brought into a humanist gathering, could the robbery have been prevented.

A right, or true worldview hold something in it relatable to human beings, and not just one bourgeois group of them. Humanism finds it self relatable to middle class liberal rationalist, but repulsive in its naivety to the rest of the world. At least here, Christianity is far superior to humanism, in that it has relatatated to all walks of people, in all walks of life, from liberals, to conservatives, from the rich to the poor, the most impoverished, and the most indulgent, to the slave master, and the slave, from the most superior of thinkers, to the least educated of men. It has had two thousands years of doubts and reflection.

Christianity holds an image relalatable to most of the world past and present a depiction of a murdered innocent as the heart of the human condition, while Humanism peddles cotton candy. There is something far more identifable for men in the image of Jesus Christ, than any image humanist have attempted to peddle.

Christianity holds an image relalatable to most of the world past and present a depiction of a murdered innocent as the heart of the human condition

Eh, what?

Do you realise how far down bullshit alley your delusions have taken you? Try to express that crap above in something approaching a sentence which a) makes grammatical sense and b) is relevant to the point of encouraging ethical behaviour.

How do you prove any worldview is the right one? How do you prove that liberalism is the right frame of mind to view the world than conservatism? How do you prove that humanism is the right worldview more so than Christianity?

I consider Christianity to be the "right one" because for me it paints the most accurate depiction of the human condition, as one of despair and hope, of love and depravity. And it stands as a worldview that murders every other sort of human illusion, in the tragedy at the heart of it, and yet picks itself out of the rubbles and envisions hope, and I find this to be empowering.

When i hear the privileged atheist mouth off about his worldview to me it ends up being a peddling of cotton candy fantasies, detached from the realities of life, it gives you Ted Turner, and life in Denmark to make sense of, Christianity gives us a murdered innocent, who for the sake of love died humiliatingly, a haunting image of man at it's bleakest, to make sense of, there's no cozy humanism here, just murdered illusions, and the last remnants of hope.

So, for the record, you picked your faith because it feels* right to you? Not because you know the christian god is the one true god, not because you know it to be true, but because of the romantic strenth of sacrifice and honour in the face of despair? That story above all others describes the human condition to you? I hate to break it to you dude, but you practically described the lord of the rings. I find the messages in that every bit as empowering as you state but I don't see any reason to base my life around that particular fiction.

ClockCat, would you have been better served by asking "How do you know your god is the one true god"? Or were you looking for a more general approach?

M

*with all the wooly connotations that implies.

Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss

If I never knew Christianity, the worldview I would have held would have been a vague resemblance of it. The depiction of the life I've know and lived, the world and the reality that I'm part of, human relationship, love, morality, justice, mercy, truth, god are to me better characterized by Christianity than any other worldview or religion. This is not beyond refute, individuals are more than welcome to argue that it isn't, and their particular view of the world is a truer depiction of it, when you have a competing secular worldview that you would like to present as truer you let know.

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Not because you know the christian god is the one true god, not because you know it to be true, but because of the romantic strength of sacrifice and honour in the face of despair?

NO, i "know" the Christian god is the one true god, in the same sense that I know "love your neighbor" is true. And secondly it's not the romantic strength of sacrifice, which can still be romantic and yet be in vain, in the face of despair that i find empowering, but the notion of it not being in vain, but in the viable form of hope. It's not in the beauty of the depiction (a view I would still hold even I was an atheist), but in the beauty of living it, that I hold it as true. It's conceiving Jesus as the truth, as the emblem of what real love is about, and the transformative power such love holds, that i find Christianity to hold the definitive claim to what God is, and about.

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I hate to break it to you dude, but you practically described the lord of the rings. I find the messages in that every bit as empowering as you state but I don't see any reason to base my life around that particular fiction.

Judging that the Lord of the Rings is a reflection of Tolkien Catholic Worldview, it shouldn't take a brainiac to figure out why you see some similarities.

Often fictive works, poetry, art, music are symbollic depictions of the reality we live in, the way it is, and the way it should be. In fact we can't demand calls for justice, morality, love, hope without aesthetic appeals as the grounding. We view the world with aesthetic lenses, humanism, or even scientism are still such lenses. You're not hard pressed to find Dawkins peddling the supposed awe and beauty of the cosmos to sell his view of the world, in fact he claims that science offers a viable alternative to replace religious awe and beauty.

A worldview is sort of like a work of art, the cheap ones fail it's depiction of how things really are, in how axed they are from the life we live, and are shallow in what sort of conclusions are drawn from this faulty view of life. The great works of art depict life at it's closest proximation, they became relatable beyond lines, speaking of the life we life, it's misery, and hopes, it's depravity and beauty.

Humanism has failed to appeal even to atheist, most of whom have never even bothered to attend a single gathering, exactly because it's aesthetically cheap, naive it's depiction of life, and cheesy in its supposed beauty.

Do you realise how far down bullshit alley your delusions have taken you? Try to express that crap above in something approaching a sentence which a) makes grammatical sense and b) is relevant to the point of encouraging ethical behaviour.

We'll allow you to explore your own question, what do you believe "encourages" ethical behavior. If you find yourself among those who have grown weary and indifferent towards others, how would you "encourage" moral behavior in them? How would you get them to love others? How do you "instruct" someone to compassion?

Although I may believe in my chosen religious beliefs, I don't believe in arguing or trying to prove that it's the right one. In my opinion, the emphasis on having faith would render all assertions of certainty impossible. If a believer knew that their beliefs were right, without a doubt, what would be the necessity of faith?

On a side note, I really like your question clock because I appreciate the thought process you are trying to provoke in believers' minds.

The implication that we should put Darwinism on trial overlooks the fact that Darwinism has always been on trial within the scientific community. -- From Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth R. Miller

Chaos and chance don't mean the absence of law and order, but rather the presence of order so complex that it lies beyond our abilities to grasp and describe it. -- From From Certainty to Uncertainty by F. David Peat

All of them, or better said, their inner (esoteric) traditions are more true. Of course, it is necessary to count with the information loss and distortion over the ages and different cultures. Nothing is infallible there, everything is relative.

ClockCat wrote:

How can you prove this, in a way all the other religions can not make the same claim?

The esoteric traditions of all greater religions are either the same, or very similar, or seems to have a common origin. Proving this requires a police method: hearing out the witnesses and comparing their testimonies. Things on which all or most of the religions can agree, are probably true. Of course, here we must count with their most original and esoteric versions. The worldly, exoteric versions were usually strongly altered by rulers and religional leaders to suit their needs. Thus they contradict each other by their very nature, because their cultures always opposed each other. Also, exoteric religions are often taken ad absurdum.

I prefer the esotericism, because it is highly scientific, practical, philosophic, humanistic, always developing, and I had seen in practice, that it works. And I have a special talent for it. Therefore, it is not a religion, though it has some elements of it. It is a religion only according to nitpickers. Of course, it is far from perfection, but nothing is perfect when it is separated from other aspects of the world. Politics, philosophy, economy, art, science, religion and esotericism must develop together, because all of these are essential ways of human activity. It's not like the esotericists want to rule the world or that everyone should be esotericists or they will end up in Hell.

Although I may believe in my chosen religious beliefs, I don't believe in arguing or trying to prove that it's the right one. In my opinion, the emphasis on having faith would render all assertions of certainty impossible. If a believer knew that their beliefs were right, without a doubt, what would be the necessity of faith?

Although I may believe in my chosen religious beliefs, I don't believe in arguing or trying to prove that it's the right one. In my opinion, the emphasis on having faith would render all assertions of certainty impossible. If a believer knew that their beliefs were right, without a doubt, what would be the necessity of faith?

On a side note, I really like your question clock because I appreciate the thought process you are trying to provoke in believers' minds.

In other words, any choice in religion without special knowledge or rational argument is entirely arbitrary. Therefore, faith is arbitrary--ergo, irrational.

ClockCat, would you have been better served by asking "How do you know your god is the one true god"? Or were you looking for a more general approach?

If I said that, it would limit the question only to people that believe in one god. This is a question open to anyone that follows a religion, giving the opportunity for them to prove why they are unique from other religions and what they have to show to prove their case, that the next person couldn't use for their god(s).

If I never knew Christianity, the worldview I would have held would have been a vague resemblance of it. The depiction of the life I've know and lived, the world and the reality that I'm part of, human relationship, love, morality, justice, mercy, truth, god are to me better characterized by Christianity than any other worldview or religion...

Often fictive works, poetry, art, music are symbollic depictions of the reality we live in, the way it is, and the way it should be. In fact we can't demand calls for justice, morality, love, hope without aesthetic appeals as the grounding...

the cheap ones fail it's depiction of how things really are, in how axed they are from the life we live, and are shallow in what sort of conclusions are drawn from this faulty view of life. The great works of art depict life at it's closest proximation, they became relatable beyond lines, speaking of the life we life, it's misery, and hopes, it's depravity and beauty.

Please excuse my snipping here. It seems to me that your whole argument is actually a reworking of the old "humanism/atheism can't account for beauty and hope and bunnies and kittens and wuv, therefore christianity ftw". Except rather than saying it can't account for beauty and hope and everything else, you're saying it doesn't give a true depiction of these things. That sir, is a rather shallow argument. Aesthetics are nice, as are all things which are appeals to emotion, but becuase something sounds nice it doesn't make it true.

Speaking of which...

manofmanynames wrote:

Judging that the Lord of the Rings is a reflection of Tolkien Catholic Worldview, it shouldn't take a brainiac to figure out why you see some similarities.

Which was exactly my point. Tolkien's book reflects everything you find good about the catholic worldview because that was largely what he believed. Why not worship the beings described in that book rather than the bible? They both give the same sense of the world. Your argument is that someone has written down emotive stories which resonate with how you've witnessed the human experience and you identify with it. I have no porblem with that. But it doesn't correlate that the stories are true.

manofmanynames wrote:

Humanism has failed to appeal even to atheist, most of whom have never even bothered to attend a single gathering, exactly because it's aesthetically cheap, naive it's depiction of life, and cheesy in its supposed beauty.

Please allow me to indulge in a little bit of reductio ad absurdum in response to your straw man here. Since when were meetings a sign of something being true? Or the the world view being accurate? I mean if that's the case I may as well rethink what that Hitler chap was saying. He held lots of meetings and loads of people attended those. He must have been on to something

Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss

ClockCat, would you have been better served by asking "How do you know your god is the one true god"? Or were you looking for a more general approach?

If I said that, it would limit the question only to people that believe in one god. This is a question open to anyone that follows a religion, giving the opportunity for them to prove why they are unique from other religions and what they have to show to prove their case, that the next person couldn't use for their god(s).

Ah, fair enough

Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss

Do you thing your religion would feel right for you if you were born in the middle east/china/India?

Well, i was born in India, so I guess the "born" factor is sort of a mute point. But I'm assuming what you meant to imply is if I was born in these regions, and raised in the particular religion most dominant there, such as Hinduism. Well, if I had the same sense of self-reflection I have now, I would have eventually rejected any of those various religions, just as I had rejected the Christianity conveyed by the church of my youth. My Christianity is fairly independent of the religion i was brought up in.

I'm familiar with various religious traditions, I admire many of them, but none of them have ever seem to be convincing, and have often been scattered reflections of the world we live in, if I had to chose between those various religious beliefs, and atheism, I would have chose atheism (just not the popular brand of it, most espoused on this forum, that just a twisted parody of the Christian faith they deny).

If i was exposed to Christianity, not by the experiences of my childhood, but my encounter with it in my adult age, from reading Dostoevsky, and the Gospels, and the picture of suffering, love, and hope in my life was somewhat consistent with what has been now, I would have "chose" Christianity, as the definitive portrait of what life is, and should be.

My faith, is as much of a choice, as what we hold as true is. It's not matter of just saying something sounds nice, therefore we decide to hold it as true, it has to make some sort of sense to us, we have to perceive it as an accurate depiction of how things are in order for us to hold it as true. I perceive reality for what it is, there may be a number of things that affect my perception of life really is, but the only religion, or secular worldview we would hold, rather than reject is one that makes sense of that perception for us. The reason why a former christian becomes an atheist, is exactly for this reason, because the religions they once held didn't make sense for them of the comfortable little lives they lived.

It's not a matter of choice, as if I could say because humanism sounds far more cozier, I can make myself believe it to be true. It's the matter of the truth we perceive by perception.

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Please excuse my snipping here. It seems to me that your whole argument is actually a reworking of the old "humanism/atheism can't account for beauty and hope and bunnies and kittens and wuv, therefore christianity ftw".

No, that's not what i said at all, humanism, and many secular worldviews attempt to convey beauty and hope. What I said is that what they have peddled in the history of secular ideas, is just cheap art, and shallow, such as Richard Dawkins fawning over the cosmos, so much so, that he desires to sell them as replacements for the inspirations of religious art, that has often been depictions of the sorrow and hopes of living, that's the peddling of a cheap aesthetic. It's not that atheist don't peddle an aesthetic, it's just that it's lousy art.

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Aesthetics are nice, as are all things which are appeals to emotion, but because something sounds nice it doesn't make it true.

Well, buddy this is a classic example of why I call atheist shallow. Because it takes nothing more than a cursory understanding of things to understand "aesthetics" are not merely nice, but a necessity for creating common bonds, for community, to convey love, to speak of justice, to advocate morality, to invoke convictions that stir reflection. Terms such as "humanity", or concepts such freedom and justice for all, that all men are equal, are meaningless if they weren't to be taken as aesthetic. I can not say to you that something you did was immoral, or your treatment of a particular person was cruel and unjust, unless we shared a common aesthetic.

If I say that love your neighbor as yourself is true, as a moral proposition, it's purely an aesthetic form of truth, how would you deny that it isn't true?

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Which was exactly my point. Tolkien's book reflects everything you find good about the catholic worldview because that was largely what he believed. Why not worship the beings described in that book rather than the bible? They both give the same sense of the world.

Well, first of all, theist don't worship "beings", just as when I claim to love my mother, it's not to say I do so because she has two hands. When a theist claims to worship Christ, it's the worship of the ideas, the meaning of what he represents, worship is directed towards the symbolism of the "being". Like if we were to worship a leprechaun it wouldn't be because he was short and green, and wore a funny hat, but for his gift of giving us a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It's the gift, that the worship is directed towards. In the same sense it's what Christ gives to the individuals believers lives, that is being worshiped.

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Your argument is that someone has written down emotive stories which resonate with how you've witnessed the human experience and you identify with it. I have no problem with that. But it doesn't correlate that the stories are true.

That's silly, I consider any story to be "true" if it resonates with our witness of the human experience, the same way I consider the tortoise and the hare, to be a "true" story, in that i find the moral and meaning of that story to be true.

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Please allow me to indulge in a little bit of reduction ad absurd um in response to your straw man here. Since when were meetings a sign of something being true? Or the the world view being accurate?

Humanism, is morality based worldview, it may advocate their views being informed by science and reason, but the grounding is purely aesthetic. Morality as most and if not all thinking atheist will say is a relative notion, and being as such moral statements can only be true in communities of shared aesthetics. Asking me to be nicer to my wife, or to be less exploitive of my workers for the sake of compassion, would easily yield a "fuck you", if we don't share a common aesthetic, on acting compassionately, for the sake of itself.

The retardatedness of humanism, is that it posses a shallow and hardly reflected on aesthetic, if it was meaningful, more and more individuals would be drawn to it, but instead the reaching effects of humanism, unlike christianity for which whose aesthetic has drawn individuals of various walks of life, and corners of the world, has been solely to a few middle class, and wealthy white dudes, who like to pat each others backs, and wear the humanistic badges as a way of saying that they are nice guys.

Why don't you tell me why I have to PROVE to you my religion is the right one?Why don't you PROVE to me that God doesn't exist,that He doesn't perform miracles,so on and so on.Atheists are always asking for proof about religion and If God is real.Jesus could be standing right in front of you and you would still deny him.

Why don't you tell me why I have to PROVE to you my religion is the right one?Why don't you PROVE to me that God doesn't exist,that He doesn't perform miracles,so on and so on.Atheists are always asking for proof about religion and If God is real.Jesus could be standing right in front of you and you would still deny him.

What would proof that god doesn't exist look like?

There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft

Why don't you tell me why I have to PROVE to you my religion is the right one?Why don't you PROVE to me that God doesn't exist,that He doesn't perform miracles,so on and so on.Atheists are always asking for proof about religion and If God is real.Jesus could be standing right in front of you and you would still deny him.

...What makes you think I was directing the question only to you? Are you saying that Scientology, Hinduism, and all the other religions are the same as yours (which I'm assuming is an Abrahamic one, since you mention Jesus)?

I am simply asking what makes any responder's religion unique, and for what they take as evidence to their belief that another religion could also not claim.

If you are asking me to disprove something, this is not the point of the thread. I am not asking you to disprove Scientology, Hinduism, Jainism, Christianity, Islam, or any other of the many religions there are. I am simply asking what makes one of them special over the others, to the person believing one of them.

Why don't you tell me why I have to PROVE to you my religion is the right one?

Burden of proof.

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Why don't you PROVE to me that God doesn't exist,that He doesn't perform miracles,so on and so on.

Burden of proof.

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Atheists are always asking for proof about religion and If God is real.Jesus could be standing right in front of you and you would still deny him.

Naked assertion.

Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare

Although I may believe in my chosen religious beliefs, I don't believe in arguing or trying to prove that it's the right one. In my opinion, the emphasis on having faith would render all assertions of certainty impossible. If a believer knew that their beliefs were right, without a doubt, what would be the necessity of faith?

On a side note, I really like your question clock because I appreciate the thought process you are trying to provoke in believers' minds.

In other words, any choice in religion without special knowledge or rational argument is entirely arbitrary. Therefore, faith is arbitrary--ergo, irrational.

I don't believe irrational can be derived so easily from arbitrary. In my opinion, something that is considered arbitrary can be more easily rendered meaningless. Which, I suppose, could be viewed as describing the same thing, but I see it as drawing an important distinction. In my opinion, what is irrational will always be irrational, whereas, what is meaningless is more of a judgement.

The implication that we should put Darwinism on trial overlooks the fact that Darwinism has always been on trial within the scientific community. -- From Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth R. Miller

Chaos and chance don't mean the absence of law and order, but rather the presence of order so complex that it lies beyond our abilities to grasp and describe it. -- From From Certainty to Uncertainty by F. David Peat

Do you thing your religion would feel right for you if you were born in the middle east/china/India?

Honestly, I don't think it would.

The implication that we should put Darwinism on trial overlooks the fact that Darwinism has always been on trial within the scientific community. -- From Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth R. Miller

Chaos and chance don't mean the absence of law and order, but rather the presence of order so complex that it lies beyond our abilities to grasp and describe it. -- From From Certainty to Uncertainty by F. David Peat